Hoyden About Town

Latest Posts from Finally, A Feminism 101 Blog

2006-08-07

Well, give me a T-shirt and call me Crunk

but Joe Francis, the guy who came up with "Girls Gone Wild", is revealed as a sordid, sexist jerk who gets off on harassing women who don't play along with his script. And worse.

Joe Francis, the founder of the "Girls Gone Wild" empire, is humiliating me. He has my face pressed against the hood of a car, my arms twisted hard behind my back. He's pushing himself against me, shouting: "This is what they did to me in Panama City!"

It's after 3 a.m. and we're in a parking lot on the outskirts of Chicago. Electronic music is buzzing from the nightclub across the street, mixing easily with the laughter of the guys who are watching this, this me-pinned-and-helpless thing.

Francis isn't laughing.

He has turned on me, and I don't know why. He's going on and on about Panama City Beach, the spring break spot in northern Florida where Bay County sheriff's deputies arrested him three years ago on charges of racketeering, drug trafficking and promoting the sexual performance of a child. As he yells, I wonder if this is a flashback, or if he's punishing me for being the only blond in sight who's not wearing a thong. This much is certain: He's got at least 80 pounds on me and I'm thinking he's about to break my left arm. My eyes start to stream tears.

The reporter had to punch him close-fisted before he let her go, and the watching police officers only intervened when Francis' bodyguard pushed her away from the group (at which point, to be fair, they realised they had not just been watching "a bit of fun" and urged the reporter to press charges, which she refused to do.)Commentary at Feministe, Pandagon, Ezra Klein and I'm sure many more feminist blogs. Twisty's post-operatively posting less frequently these days, alas, and her last post is skewering Tucker Max instead, but I'm sure she'll get around to Joe Francis soon.

My main problem with the GGW and similar programmes is that they represent young women's sexuality purely in terms of their objectification by the men around them. There is no healthy internalised sexuality shown by the "girls", it's all externalised display for the male gaze. And then they dress that fetishised objectification up as sexually empowering for women. Fuck that.